Green Party leader Elizabeth May arrested at Kinder Morgan protest

Green Party leader Elizabeth May (MP, Saanich-Gulf Islands), arrested today at the Burnaby Mountain worksite of the Kinder Morgan pipeline project, is promising to stand firm with the Tsleil-waututh, Squamish and Musqueum First Nations and their supporters across Canada in opposing the “disastrous, climate-destroying Trans Mountain pipeline expansion.”

“I am keeping my word,” said Ms. May after she was released. “I said I would stand in solidarity with the First Nations opposing Kinder Morgan and I am keeping my word.

“Non-violent civil disobedience is legitimate as a means of expression but it is a step I have not taken before. Even standing on the logging roads of Clayoquot Sound in 1993, I stepped aside when asked to do so. I can no longer step aside.”

Ms. May said that she respects our courts and does not take violating an injunction lightly. “I await the court ruling on the legitimacy of the permit issued to Kinder Morgan. Unfortunately, the federal government and the Texas corporation are not awaiting the ruling of the Federal Court. Kinder Morgan is committed to acts constituting irreparable harm ‒ to the environment and to indigenous rights.

“I will continue to stand in solidarity with the First Nations on whose land these acts of vandalism are now being committed. Non-violent civil disobedience is the moral obligation of the climate-aware, responsible citizen.”

Kinder Morgan has broken the law crossing streams and endangers our world’s health and they are not carted of to jail. Elizabeth May who is the leader of the Federal Green Party and represents 1000s of Canadians protests and is arrested. There is something wrong with our system. Children born this year will probably live to the year 3000 if we do not destroy it with our careless attitude. Lets not be so short sighted and develop some vision – we need to start phasing out oil and oil products immediately!

The world can’t phase out oil as thousands of products are made from it.Google how many things in your house & what you wear are by products. Please get educated on all the extra costs to live.Yes we can cut down as solar,wind & water power becomes less expensive but we need oil.Electric cars have lots of oil products in them.Plastic an many more items.

KM wasn’t supposed to cross streams with salmon spawning and they laid an orange liner in the stream so the fish would go away and they could lay the pipe. There are many more infractions and they aren’t arrested. Don’t you think the survival of wild salmon and BC fishing jobs is far more important than funding Alberta. Alberta could build a refinery and process the bitumen in Alberta and create more jobs and supply Canada with usable oil. The pipeline is to move it to the coast for shipment to other countries for processing.

Business as usual right? How educated about climate change and pollution are you. We need more creative thinkers to fix the mess we are in. One easy idea is have Alberta process the bitumen in Alberta and supply Canada with the oil products we need.

Why is it okay to dump raw sewage into the ocean from Victoria, why are the Green Party not protesting this. Right in their own back yard. Got something to complain or protest about let’s see what you leaf lickers will do and I will join you.

Build the damn extension with extreme quality controls while they are still in office and in control of it. Our species will be extinct within the next 200 years so it’s a moot point. We have gone so far past the tipping point of environmental cataclysm there is no coming back. Focus on something that matters such as our vermin like population growth.

While I am some what in favour of Kinder Morgan’s new pipeline (* the new additioin that is ten times less likely to leak than the existing ones) I am also in favour of the public discourse and peaceful protest of it.

We need this dialogue to ensure that we get it correct.

I fully support Elizabeth May and whoever said that she should be kicked out of her elected position if found guilty of anything: I have only this to say:

All around the world every day we read about despots and dictators who use sham elections to claim they were democratically chosen by their people…one of the most used tactics is to jail the opposition with some charge or other and then claim they can not run due to a criminal record.

Here in Canada we protect democracy by allowing anyone to run who is a Canadian Adult. This is what it means to be democratic. Your suggestion to kick out anyone with a crime in their past is what dictators do and is the opposite of Democracy. Thank goodness you are not in charge of anything and if you are: please resign right now.